Cedric had thought his life was over, that day he was sent to Castle Reinfeld. The Nüish mercenaries had paid him little attention while the house standard bore his litter, but they had stopped the Archne party long before the fighting ever began. The thick smell of the early summer air, of wet grasses and beckoning flora, congealed in his nostrils and somewhere deep in the recesses of his mind, Cedric detected the stillness of an impending attack. The cautions of the Nü were not much later aroused as the litter came to a stop.
Without warning, they were upon the Archne party and the cry of the Nü raised the alarm throughout the parade of Reinfeld bound travelers. Not once did Cedric lift the embroidered velvet purple curtains. Men screamed around him as they were cut down like dogs, but Cedric did not stir. One by one, his litter bearers abandoned him- to visit their Master of the Mountain, as the Nü called the Void, or to join the fray, he could not be sure.
Yet victory was to be the Nü's and when the initial fighting had died down around his litter, the mousy man had finally gathered enough courage to lift the purple veil. He beheld the plethora of bodies, Eirdren and Nüish alike, asleep at his feet, but the standing Nü outnumbered the few pale continentals. Annihilation was not far.
Cedric had seen it in periphery as ¨he scanned the battlefield. The short sword sunk into his lord-master's body and the look of horror that bloomed on his killer's face; when the Archne chef beheld Onion and Henri Archne's deadly dance, the weight of futility descended on his heart and smothered his fear.
The rest of that battle was a blacked out blur in his memory. Vague hints of hurried action, running towards the Oaken Wood, seeking out allies he never knew existed, Cedric could distinguish nothing of those moments in time from a dream or flights of fantasy. His only sure memory was of being hoisted upon a horse fully conscious, along with the Nüish girl fully unconscious, bound once more for Eirdred.
Until that moment, he had never been on a horse. The Heilthian beast was rare in these areas; only a few City Enforcers had brought them from home. The mare was a rich copper brown with a nose and hooves dipped in black, not unlike the coloring of the Nü, he later reflected. And like the Nü, this beast would lead him to more misery, of that he was certain.
The City Enforcers had not been unkind, but they were quick to surrender their charges in light of the Archne regicide. The order tread a precarious balance between keeping the peace and enforcing the Empress's will, and not being seen as meddlers in internal politics. The poor chef could not have been world disrupting that balance.
The first night, alone in solitary confinement, he cried. He cried until his eyes went puffy and his throat constricted and gave out, but his calls went unanswered. He cried for mercy and he cried for justice, but the calls went unheeded. By the time he was removed to the dungeon, he could not cry anymore.
He was suspicious of life by the time his request for a Fal'du Rel was granted, but the priest gave him a modicum of comfort. The request was not an unusual one; as a lifelong Eirdred native, his devotion to the patron Keeper of the province was a piety to be lauded.
He was surprised to see Gregor. Not two weeks earlier he had met the man by chance on the street, in the markets of Durendul District, soliciting alms for the church in the street. The man had been chatty and charismatic after Cedric deposited two coppers in his bowl and Cedric could not help but invite the man for lunch the following day. An Ally of Rel was a good man with whom to keep company.
Their reunion in the dungeon was coincidence, was it not? There were many Fal'du Rel in Eirdred. In the hours he spoke with Gregor, however, it had become clear that the man was not there to shepherd his soul with the guidance of Rel, but to shepherd his body to freedom.
Why?
Questions such as this never crossed the mind of the Archne chef. Questions brought troublesome answers and even more troubling consequences. People who asked questions disappeared, people who asked questions were beaten or exiled. Those who did their job and did not ask questions lived, and perhaps even lived well.
But during those moments, he did have hope, and he clung to it like a barnacle on a boat.
In the small tavern inn, free of the prison, and the mental strife that followed, Cedric appraised the man Gregor from the pallet. He had to admit, he liked the friendly man. There was something about his presence that made Cedric feel at home, like the man was family. Even though it was now clear that he consorted with what had to be the blackest of magics, he bore the guttural instinct sprouting affection for his savior, but he did his best to block out attempts for a rational for this fondness. Thinking lead to questions and questions led to intractably difficult situations.
To experience death but not die, to feel the deadness of another body, as Cedric had experienced, was no natural phenomenon. How does one produce such a sensation?, yet another question surfaced in his mind only to be drowned by fear and uncertainty.
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